Our customers have been asking for a web viewer for years and we finally have one! The basic usage of the viewer is to put a MindManager .mmap file on the web and add some code to an HTML page so that the map appears on the web page. Viewers of the page have to do a one-time install of a small browser plug-in and then they can see, but not edit the map in a Microsoft Internet Explorer web browser. The following code will put the demo.mmap into a 400×300 viewer:
<!– Begin MindManager Viewer –>
<script type=”text/javascript”>
MindManager_image=”http://blog.mindmanager.com/labs/demo.mmap“;
MindManager_id=”map1″;
MindManager_width=”400″;
MindManager_height=”300″;
MindManager_toolbar=”1″;
MindManager_emptySpaceMenu=”1″;
MindManager_purchaseCommand=”1″;
MindManager_promoSpace=”1″;
MindManager_xml =””;
MindManager_xsl =””;
MindManager_style=””;
</script>
<script type=”text/javascript” src=”http://blog.mindmanager.com/labs/AddViewer.js”></script>
<!– End MindManager Viewer –>
A more advanced scenario is one of information visualization where XML data on the web is transformed into maps in the viewer. Because MindManager’s data model is based on XML, any XML format on the webcan be transformed to MindManager’s XML. This means that RSS files can be shown in a Map. I have created a page which demonstrates how the many flavors of RSS can be transformed into MindManager Maps. This works by transforming the RSS XML into MindManager XML using XSLT. Add the viewer to your web page and give it a try. The following code will put the Technorati blog rss into a 400×300 viewer:
<!– Begin MindManager Viewer –>
<script type=”text/javascript”>
MindManager_image=””;
MindManager_id=”map1″;
MindManager_width=”400″;
MindManager_height=”300″;
MindManager_toolbar=”1″;
MindManager_emptySpaceMenu=”1″;
MindManager_purchaseCommand=”1″;
MindManager_promoSpace=”1″;
MindManager_xml =”http://www.technorati.com/weblog/index.xml“;
MindManager_xsl =”http://blog.mindmanager.com/labs/FromRSS.xslt“;
MindManager_style=”http://blog.mindmanager.com/labs/rss.xml“;
</script>
<script type=”text/javascript” src=”http://blog.mindmanager.com/labs/AddViewer.js”></script>
<!– End MindManager Viewer –>
If you’re technically inclined, look at and modify the http://blog.mindmanager.com/labs/FromRSS.xslt to parse other XML formats. See how the format of the map is defined in the http://blog.mindmanager.com/labs/rss.xml map file. Once you get the hang of it the MindManager XML format is easy to work with.
In the business solutions group at Mindjet, we have created a number of demonstrations like this that we will be using to get customers, software developers, and parters excited about building MindManager-based solutions. Over the next few months, we will be introducing these demos, most with source code, in a new Mindjet Labssite.
Stay tuned… it’s going to be really cool!
Michael S. Scherotter
Business Solutions Architect
Mindjet LLC